Chapter 3
Married
Monte
The wolf in the mirror really looked nothing like me. That was the foremost thought in my mind as Nena fluttered about, ensuring that not a single thread of fabric or strand of hair was out of place.
Against all my innermost desires, in spite of my wishes and my fervent pleading with the Goddess, the day of my wedding had arrived, and now I was going to be tied to Hunter Redrow for the rest of my life.
“You look so handsome,” Nena murmured as she deftly adjusted the ceremonial wedding robe I had on, a beloved heirloom that had been passed down through the SanGraal family for generations.
She was right, which was the main reason why I couldn’t recognize myself in the mirror.
Whoever the wolf was gazing back at me, they looked serene, composed, and like the ideal bride.
The brown eyes offered a hint of daring, and the shadows under them were not a testament to exhaustion, but a promise of deep heat in the dark of night.
It was an illusion of cosmetics and my sister’s expertise, one that I was more than happy to hide behind.
The disparity between how I looked and felt had never been so vast. Nowhere on this bride’s face was there evidence of the gnawing chasm inside me, a pit of hopelessness that threatened to swallow me whole.
But as Nena tittered about, I tried to focus on how much she was enjoying this.
It was rare to see her so animated, and even if a part of her was worried about my future, there was also a part of her that took a very wholesome enjoyment in dressing me up.
As long as I focused on that, then it was much easier to ignore my own sickening sense of foreboding.
My pack would be saved with this marriage. That was all that mattered. As long as I married Hunter Redrow, everyone’s future would be secured.
That was the only thing that made this price worth paying. I did care about my pack. I just wished the consequences of this marriage weren’t so damning.
The door opened, startling me from my reverie, and my father stepped into the dressing room. He looked uncomfortable as he stood there in the doorway, decked in the deep browns and blacks of his formal attire, but the moment he laid eyes on me, his face somehow softened and stiffened again at once.
“You look…” he trailed off, then coughed awkwardly and began again. “You look beautiful, Monte. And… thank you for doing this. It means a lot to us. Your mother would have been very proud.”
He looked as if he was going to say something else, but thought better of it. He roughly cleared his throat and hurried out of the room, leaving his two children alone once again.
Nena and I shared a deeply surprised glance, her eyebrows just as high as mine felt.
“I don’t think I’ve ever heard Father talk like that,” Nena said.
“Neither have I.”
Suddenly, Nena frowned fiercely and attacked my hair once more, discarding her previous work and starting fresh. “Well, good! He’d better appreciate the sacrifice you’re making. Or else,” she added, her voice dropping into something dangerous.
I squeezed her hand, and let Nena continue her fussing. There was really nothing else to do but wait for the signal that it was time. Since Hunter had ruined the pomp and circumstance of the Knocking, my pack had been adamant that the wedding should be as correct and proper as possible.
An hour and half later, I started to wonder if something had gone horribly wrong. Why wasn’t I being summoned to the temple?
“Maybe we should check if everything is alright?” I asked tentatively, trying and failing not to fidget with the sleeves of my robe.
Nena chewed on her lip for a moment, then nodded. “Yeah, they’re starting to take too long. Maybe we should go down and wait in the common room with the others.”
Together we left the room and headed down the stairs, only to find the rest of the bridal party pacing impatiently, my father foremost among them.
He looked flustered as he compulsively smoothed his hands over his face, too unnerved to hold together his image as the steadfast head of the pack.
Our family too had been waiting—but not for us.
When my father looked up and saw me, several emotions quickly flashed across his face before finally settling on relief.
“Here, let’s go down to the ceremony grounds right away,” he said as he hurried over. “Perhaps they’re already there and waiting for us.”
“We just got back from there and there wasn’t any sign of him,” one of my cousins grumbled, but everyone followed obediently as we left for the temple.
“What’s going on?” I asked my father under my breath as we walked together, speaking so softly the veil barely moved.
“Nothing you need to worry about,” he reassured me with a smile, but the effect was undercut by the nervous wince in his voice.
“Don’t tell me, nobody can find the groom,” Nena growled. “He would just up and abandon Monte at the altar?”
Hope blossomed in my chest, but I didn’t dare cling to it. Would I really be lucky enough for Hunter to call off the wedding? It seemed too good to be true. If the Redrows broke the agreement by calling off the wedding, then my pack wouldn’t be held responsible.
The ceremony was to take place at the Temple of the Goddess, which had a white dome roof that gleamed atop an impressive array of carved pillars.
The surrounding ceremonial grounds were extensive, and they were presently filled by wolves from a dozen different packs, who were currently milling around impatiently and huffing to themselves in annoyance.
“Did we keep them waiting?” I asked, as panic clawed at my throat.
“No, no,” my father said quickly. “You are supposed to arrive after the groom, but it would seem he’s running a little late.”
The rich, measured timbre of his voice held steady , but I could feel his apprehension in his tightening grip on my arm as he escorted me up the stage, where the elderly officiants waited in their black robes, my bridal party trailing behind.
However, as my father and I ascended the steps, I saw that there was one other present.
Felix Redrow.
The Alpha fumed in silent, simmering outrage as he paced back and forth before the Redrow elders who were seated to the left side of the stage.
His ceremonial black-and-white robe, edged in gold trim and marked with the Redrow crest, swept sharply around his legs with each turn, revealing the tux he wore beneath.
Felix barely acknowledged our arrival, only casting a flickering glance past us that didn’t reach so far as our eyes, before resuming his stalking back and forth across the platform, his jaw clenching so tightly that the vein in his temple bulged.
Only time would tell when he would explode.
“Maybe the groom will hurry now that he knows we’ve arrived,” my father whispered, as if to reassure me, but I could hear the hopeless desperation in his voice.
I nodded, but said nothing as my father and the rest of the bridal party moved to the right side of the stage to take their seats with the elders of our pack.
Standing alone in the wide space between the two packs, I surveyed the crowd, and my gut churned as I took in the hundreds and hundreds of wolves who had gathered.
I tried to convince myself that most were just here to witness the joining of our packs, that as far as they were concerned, I was just a pawn being moved around the board of the game of politics.
In an unlikely way, that actually did reassure me a little.
As long as I played my role, everything would be fine. It had to be.
Since we had arrived, wouldn’t Hunter surely make his dramatic entrance shortly thereafter?
But as the moments stretched on, there was nothing but a growing restlessness among the gathered wolves.
They had perked up at my arrival, and now they were becoming louder in their grumbling about the ceremony’s delay.
As more of the attendees began to move about the temple, I barely caught the flash of motion on the groom’s side. But there could be no ignoring when a Redrow page hurried up the steps, looking extremely shaken, and rushed to Felix’s side.
Whatever he whispered in his Alpha’s ear, it turned Felix’s mood from thundercloud to lightning bolt, from dormant volcano to rain of ash.
The growl he unleashed seemed to shake the very stone.
When the messenger slipped a note to him, he gnashed his teeth before unfolding the piece of paper, appearing to guess its contents without needing to read its words
I watched his eyes flash flecks of fiery gold as they roamed the page from top to bottom, then returned to the top and started once more.
Three times he read the note, his face shading more sanguine with each pass, until his claws were fully drawn and the paper was falling to shredded tatters at his feet.
His silent rage was so chilling that I nearly took a step back, though I managed—barely—to stand my ground.
But then Felix looked over at me, and there was such brutal accusation in his silver gaze that all my willpower drained away, leaving me frozen in place.
Only my locked-up knees prevented me from collapsing to the ground.
With quick, long strides, he closed the distance. Heedless of the watching crowd, he came so near I could feel the heat of his breath and see the fiery gold of his eyes burn into me.
“Did you know of this?” he growled. “Did you help plan this?”